Speakon Question

So I pulled the trigger on a used GK 700rb-ii and a used GK 410SBX from GC. It's almost quite certainly a given that I will not be getting the Speakon cable that would have come with the cab had I bought it new. I do have an old Speakon cable from a Carvin RL-1000 and RL410 that I used to have. I found the old Carvin catalogue that I ordered that amp from and found the model number for that Speakon cable to be SP5.

What I'm wondering is how I might be able to tell whether this is a 2, 4, or 8 pole cable. I couldn't find any specifications online for this particular cable. Is there a way to tell just by looking at it? Would I be able to tell just by using it and determining whether the biamping system is working? If that is the case, what would happen if it is biamped vs not?

It definitely won't be an 8. 4's are almost a defacto standard. 4's usually have button you pull back to unlock, 2's have a sleeve. A 2 will plug into a 4 socket, a 4 will not plug into a 2 socket. I think, it may be the reverse of that, been long time since I messed with nl2's

Exactly. If you're just using it for a regular speaker cable, you use 2-conductor wire and connect it to the 1+/1- poles. No muss, no fuss. Usually for bridged mono, you use 1+/2+ at the amp end and 1+/1- at the speaker end. It won't hurt anything if you connect the cable backwards, but you won't get any sound. For bi-amp, you run four-conductor cable 1+/1-/2+/2- the same on both ends.